


Sutures

by Beleriandings



Series: Another year [3]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Episode Fix-It: s02e13 Exit Wounds (Torchwood), F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-18 06:08:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29363781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beleriandings/pseuds/Beleriandings
Summary: After the dust settles, Martha sees to the team's wounds, and she and Tosh get a chance to rest.
Relationships: Martha Jones/Toshiko Sato
Series: Another year [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2156262
Comments: 6
Kudos: 10
Collections: Torchwood Fan Fests: 2021 Femslash Fest





	Sutures

**Author's Note:**

> Set in my AU where Tosh is with Martha the whole time during the Year That Never Was, Martha goes to work for Torchwood instead of UNIT after that, and the two of them dating throughout all of Torchwood s2!
> 
> Written for Torchwood Fan Fests Femslash Fest 2021, for the prompts "black and blue", and "fix-it".

It had been a very, very long day.

Tosh almost couldn’t believe she had set out just this morning – actually yesterday morning, but she hadn’t slept since – before it all, without the dust of the warehouse explosion in her hair and before the city had fallen apart around them; it seemed like such a different time. As though time had been taken away from the rest of the world, just like before.

Except this time it hadn’t. This time, they’d all lived through the same horrors, witnessed them together as they unfolded. This time, there was no undoing it.

The hours after it was all over seemed to disappear in a haze of relief and pain, mingled together as they tried to patch the wounds the day had left behind as best they could. The hours passed strangely, drawn out and collapsed by the effect of the pain medication and the aftermath of the adrenaline and the exhausting, wringing relief of them all being alive.

It was only much later, when Martha had tucked them both up in bed and pulled her into her arms, that Tosh finally let herself break.

Her head swam with painkillers, her body numbed but her chest tight with a deeper ache, a little less and more than physical. The world suddenly felt very heavy and very large, as though Martha’s arms were the only thing holding her to the planet. As though if she wasn’t careful she might spin off into eternity.

She put her face against Martha’s shoulder, and broke apart sobbing. She was very glad that Martha had judged her okay to go home, rather than try to sleep in the sterile coolness of the medbay, the background hum of the Hub and the beep of electronics and the Rift manipulator all around; normally she’d find it familiar and comforting, but today she felt pathetically relieved to be away from it all, to be home again.

She suspected Martha understood that she’d sleep better in her own bed, and Jack had clearly understood too, giving them permission to go home on the understanding that Martha would report in the morning, and that Tosh would be okay as long as she was there watching over her.

Tosh wasn’t _okay_ , though, not exactly; small motions hurt, the shift of her body, the change of position jarred her broken arm in its cast a little, sending a sharper pain through the wound in her stomach that cut through the fuzzy numbness of the drugs, and it only made her gasp against the shoulder of Martha’s shirt, sobbing even harder.

Martha’s hand came up and rubbed her back, in slow circles at the base of her spine. She could feel Martha’s tears against the side her neck too, though Martha wasn’t saying anything; there was nothing really _to_ say, just the pain and the relief of having survived, having just barely kept their friends alive and come through themselves.

Come through, yes, but not unscathed. Tosh only gave thanks to the universe that Martha only had superficial injuries, shallow cuts and bruises from the warehouse explosion but nothing worse. But she _was_ hurt, Tosh knew; they all were even if it didn’t show outwardly, and didn’t they both know what that was like? Except now it was the whole team, rather than just herself and Martha.

She’d seen it in Gwen too, also relatively unhurt – physically – by the experience. But Tosh wasn’t fooled by that; in the hours immediately afterwards, Gwen had been running herself ragged trying to keep the city together, her eyes haunted and terrified, gaze flicking between them as though counting the survivors, clinging to Rhys’s hand so hard that both their knuckles were white, her face tear-stained yet still determined.

From her place in the medbay after Martha had stitched her wound and set her broken arm, Tosh had just been able to catch a glimpse of Gwen sitting with Owen in the main part of the Hub. He’d helped Martha see to Tosh’s wounds initially, but afterwards all the more minor cuts and bruises were more of a one-person job, so he’d gone off to see to things at the hospital once more; no sooner had he got back, then Gwen had pulled him aside. To check on him, Tosh supposed, since Owen had come far too close to dying today, for the second time in only a few weeks.

She couldn’t quite make out exactly what they were saying from the bed that had been wheeled down into the medbay for her, but she could hear the vague shapes of their voices drifting down, echoing indistinctly off the tiles. She let their tense conversation wash over her, mingling with Martha and Ianto’s voices as Ianto sat on the examination table with his shirt unbuttoned to let Martha patiently check over the array of cuts and purpling bruises that covered his previously-dislocated shoulder and his chest, prodding and poking him gently as she checked for cracked ribs. At some point Jack had returned from sending John on his way and then turned to hanging over the three of them, watching them intently from the medbay stairs. Tosh had turned away, wanting to give them a little privacy, but the only other option was to look over at the door to catch sight of where Owen had clutched his knees, pale and staring fixedly at the floor and speaking to Gwen in halting tones; Tosh knew how close he’d come to dying in that nuclear power plant, right on the heels of his near-miss at the Pharm and his slow recovery from his – thankfully glancing – bullet wound.

Tosh felt guilty for his sake herself today; if she’d just been a bit quicker, taken a bit better care of him, then he wouldn’t have had to go through what he did...

But no, said the part of her that sounded like Martha, the part of her that was kind to herself, that Tosh was slowly learning to listen to. It wasn’t her fault; she’d nearly died today herself, she’d done as much as she could in the circumstances. And they were all still here, weren’t they? That was something, at least. It mattered.

That may be true, she thought, but it didn’t make what had happened any easier. Especially not for Jack. Tosh felt even more guilt when she thought of the haunted look in his eyes.

Because she was sure Jack was the worst off, and the fact that it wasn’t any kind of physical wound made that somehow even more true. Tosh had seen the way he’d looked after coming up from the ground – she could barely conceive of what it was like to live for two thousand years, let alone buried under the earth – and she’d seen the coldness in his eyes after he’d locked his brother’s body away in cold storage. Jack had loved him once, Tosh knew, but he’d done that all the same. Because he loved Tosh, and because he loved the city, and because someone had to.

Tosh shuddered at the memory of the crack of a gun, the pain in her stomach and her blood spilling onto the floor of the Hub. If Martha hadn’t been there, she knew, she’d certainly be dead right now herself, bleeding out on the Hub floor. And if she was dead, then Owen probably would be too, or else they’d all have been obliterated or dying slowly of radiation poisoning as the nuclear plant went into meltdown.

As it was, they were all – more or less – safe and in one piece. But the city wasn’t, Tosh knew. There was rebuilding to do, and clean-up. But not right now. Every single one of them had been falling asleep on their feet – Ianto actually had fallen asleep at one point, while leaning against the side of his desk, only to be caught by Gwen as she came past him, blinking and shoving his hands over his eyes as he tried to shake himself awake again.

That was about the point Jack had sent the rest of them home, no excuses. Come back in the morning – and it already was the morning, Tosh had realised later, but she wasn’t really thinking straight enough to remember that then – and get a fresh start.

And so they’d left, Martha’s arm careful around her waist, both holding her up and taking exquisite care not to jar Tosh’s bandaged wounds. They’d barely talked as Martha drove them home to their flat and helped her change out of the spare clothes she’d had at the Hub – the ones she’d been wearing had been covered in dust from the explosion and her own blood – and into pyjamas, before helping her into bed.

And here they were, and that was all it had taken before they were both crying into one another’s shoulders.

They’d been through so much together, was the thing. That Year had brought them close in ways the others could never understand. They were more than lovers now, more than anything there was a word for, and Tosh knew that Martha understood her perfectly, just as she understood Martha.

That didn’t change what had happened, of course. But as it always did, it helped Tosh to lay her head on Martha’s shoulder, a place from which things always seemed a little better even when they were at their darkest.

She raised her head, bleary-eyed and sleepy, and Martha did too, their faces resting together between them. Tosh could feel the warm wetness of tears mingling on their skin between, but she just let them flow, letting herself take comfort in the warmth of Martha’s arms.

After a moment though, she drew back and kissed her slowly, the motion of their lips almost hypnotic with the medication-dulled ache and the way her body was crying out at her to submit to sleep. Yet this was important, this affirmation of the way they were; she kissed her carefully, knowing Martha knew what she meant. And clearly she did because she kissed her back just as softly, before taking her in her arms, sighing and helping Tosh lie down amidst the pillows.

“Come on, remember what Jack said. You need sleep,” she said, helping her rearrange their position so Tosh wasn’t going to jar her broken arm or her stomach wound – not necessarily easy – and pulling her close. They’d ended up with Tosh curled on her side and Martha at her back, spooned up behind her; this wasn’t how they usually slept, and it was still a little uncomfortable with her wounds. But given everything, it was probably as good as they’d get. All she really cared about was sleep and having Martha close to her, anyway.

And besides, they’d both been in worse places. That was what Tosh told herself, when things got hard. Not that it was much comfort, but it was something. She took Martha’s hand and pressed the backs of her fingers to her mouth; loving hands, hands that fixed and stitched the wounds in her body and in her heart. “You need to sleep too,” she said, against Martha’s knuckles. She smiled apologetically there. “Lots to do tomorrow, and you’re the one with two good arms.”

Martha laughed wearily against her back. “I know,” she said. “Tomorrow, though.”

“Tomorrow,” said Tosh, tucking Martha’s hand in under the duvet over them as she felt Martha press a kiss to the back of her neck.

And before long, comforted by Martha’s warmth behind her, she let the darkness claim her and fell into a deep and peaceful sleep.


End file.
